Elon Musk Threatens To Ban Apple Phones

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has announced he plans to ban Apple devices being used at his companies.

Musk’s announcement comes after Apple announced it plans to partner with Open AI’s artificial intelligence.

In a post on X, Musk wrote “It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security & privacy!”

Musk added that if “Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies. That is an unacceptable security violation.”

It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security & privacy!

Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2024

If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies. That is an unacceptable security violation.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2024

Here’s what CBS News reported:

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is threatening to ban his employees from taking Apple devices into their workplaces after Apple CEO Tim Cook announced a partnership on Monday to integrate OpenAI’s artificial intelligence technology into its operating systems.

On Monday evening, Musk wrote on his social media platform X that adding OpenAI’s tech into Apple’s systems “is an unacceptable security violation.” He added that visitors to his businesses, which also include SpaceX, “will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage.”

Musk’s threat to ban Apple devices at his workplaces, which employ more than 100,000 workers across Tesla, SpaceX and X alone, comes amid a legal battle between the Tesla CEO and OpenAI. In March, Musk sued OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman, alleging that the artificial intelligence company had violated its original mission statement by putting profits over benefiting humanity.

Apple’s announcement of its partnership with OpenAI emphasized that users’ personal data would remain private, even as the iPhone maker integrates AI into operating systems including iOS 18 and macOS Sequoia. The tech giant said it won’t collect data on users or search their personal data stored on their devices when they use the AI system.

Yet Musk expressed skepticism that that Apple users’ personal data will remain private.

And visitors will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2024

Per CNN:

Elon Musk is not happy about a new partnership between Apple and ChatGPT creator OpenAI.

In a post to X Monday, the Tesla (TSLA) chief executive said he would ban Apple (AAPL) devices at his companies — which include SpaceX and X, among others — if the iPhone maker went ahead with its AI plans announced Monday.

If Apple “integrates OpenAI at the (operating system) level,” Musk said that would constitute “an unacceptable security violation.”

He added that visitors “will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage,” referring to an enclosure that blocks electromagnetic waves crucial to communications, including cellular, wireless internet and Bluetooth signals.

“Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI,” Musk said in a separate post. “They’re selling you down the river.”

Musk has previously hinted at creating a phone of his own:

Elon Musk six months ago: "If there's an essential need to make a phone, I'll make a phone." pic.twitter.com/6Zfks5bp9P

— ELON DOCS (@elon_docs) June 10, 2024